Vontae Davis trade a better deal than Colts expected

Posted by Michael David Smith on January 6, 2013, 11:15 AM EST

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One of the most memorable moments from the past season of Hard Knocks came when the Dolphins told cornerback Vontae Davis he was traded to the Colts, prompting Davis to express, in shock, “I need to call my grandma.”

We never heard how Davis’s grandma felt about the trade, but the Colts have to feel pretty good about it.

The Colts gave up a second-round pick and a conditional sixth-round pick for Davis, but they won’t end up giving as much as they expected. For starters, the Colts’ second-round pick will not be as good a pick as anyone would have thought before the season: Both the Colts and the Dolphins probably figured at the time of the trade that the Colts’ second-round pick would be somewhere in the 30s, as the Colts were expected to be one of the worst teams in the league. But as a surprise playoff team, the Colts’ second-round pick will be somewhere in the 50s or 60s, depending on how far they advance into the playoffs.

And ESPN’s Adam Schefter reports that the condition for the sixth-round pick was that Davis play at least 65 percent of the Colts’ defensive snaps. Davis missed some of the season with a sprained left knee, and according to FootballOutsiders.com, he played 56 percent of the Colts’ defensive snaps. So the Dolphins won’t get the Colts’ sixth-round pick.

When healthy, Davis has played well — well enough in the season-ending win over the Texans that he was the AFC defensive player of the week for Week 17. The Colts will gladly accept the production Davis has given them at the cost of a late second-round pick.

Yeah great trade for them and a stupid move for the Dolphins. Amazing that they didn’t fire the Dolphins staff for yet another weak year especially when they are going out of their way to make highly embarrassing trades.

I think it ended up working great for Miami. He had lost his starting job to Richard Marshall, and wasn’t playing well (or with consistent effort). As others have said most of the year he was disappointing. He was going to be a free agent, and no way Miami would have resigned him and Smith, who has proven to be a better player. So they traded their third best corner, who they weren’t going to resign anyways, for a second round pick. Sound good for Miami to me.